


a soft and foolish heart

by dryswallow



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Based on OVA3, F/F, Pre-Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-14
Updated: 2014-08-14
Packaged: 2018-02-12 19:42:36
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 689
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2122332
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dryswallow/pseuds/dryswallow
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It wasn't that Krista had wanted the man to live; she just didn't want to see him die.</p>
            </blockquote>





	a soft and foolish heart

**Author's Note:**

> based directly off of OVA3. some reference to manga spoilers.

“That's fucked up,” Ymir said. “Fucked up from start to finish.”

They aren't the words that Krista herself would have chosen, but Ymir was right. It had been awful. While the mission was happening, Krista was unable to do anything but react. There was no time to consider just how extreme the situation was. It was only when they got back to their barracks and Krista was asked to tell her side of the story that she began to feel the weight of what had happened.

Each time she told the story in her quiet voice, Krista watched the faces of her listeners closely. The way their eyes widened with fear and surprise, and how they smiled at the story's happy ending. Their reactions filled her with a conditional kind of warmth that she was beginning to know well.

It was only Ymir who dragged her away from the others to an empty courtyard and insisted on a private telling of the story. It was only Ymir who returned her observant stares from where she stood by the courtyard's gate, looking at Krista just as closely as Krista had been looking at her.

And when the story ended, Ymir had laughed

“I can't believe you stopped Mikasa from killing him.” Ymir shook her head, incredulous.

“It was the right thing to do,” Krista said adamantly. “I heard him talking about his family, about his daughter...”

“What a soft and foolish heart you have,” Ymir said. “There's no guarantee any of it was even true. You know he just said that because he was desperate, right? People say all kinds of desperate shit when they're about to die.”

How would you know that? Krista wanted to ask, but she held herself back.

“I would've killed him, if he'd tried something like that with me,” Ymir continued. “You know what they were going to do with you, yeah? Doesn't matter if he had a family. Piece of shit.”

Krista bit at her lip in silence. She couldn't think of a response for Ymir, and even if she could have, she didn't have the energy to argue. Her body was still reeling from the mission, exhausted and on edge both at once.

Besides, it wasn't that Krista had wanted the man to live; she just didn't want to see him die. She knew how sharp Mikasa's blade was, and how little effort it would have taken to slice open the man's throat. If Mikasa was merciful, she would have taken his head right off. If not, she could have chosen to push the blade into his throat and then dragged it through his flesh. He would have thrashed uselessly as he died, and the blood swelling at the wound in his neck would have frothed with air from his severed windpipe. If he had anything else to say, no one would have been able to hear it.

Her mother...

Krista flinched, trying to shut out the images.

“At least you were fighting them off a bit though,” Ymir said. “I'm proud of you for that.”

“I was lucky,” Krista told her. “I could have made things much worse by struggling. But I didn't... I didn't want to die.”

She didn't want to die _then_ , her mind corrected. It wasn't the right time. The situation was all wrong.

The death she desired was not one that was useless and easily forgotten. It was not one that would have burdened others.

"Of course you didn't want to die," Ymir said.

She put an arm around Krista's shoulder and pulled her in close. Krista felt her body stiffen instinctively, but not as much as it did when Ymir first began to be affectionate with her. She was unfamiliar with being touched like this, with having someone come so near to her without hesitation or violence. Ymir was strange, an anomaly in her life. Krista still didn't know what to make of her.

"And it doesn't matter that it could've made things worse," Ymir continued, once Krista had relaxed. "I'm happy you fought back anyway. You couldn't stop me from being proud, even if you tried!"


End file.
